Thursday, July 5, 2012

The school year ended more than a month ago and all I can say about Amanda's 7th grade year was she got her money's worth.  She matured so much in the new environment that it is nearly impossible to list all of her new abilities so I won't really try.  What I will say is this, she has become the most delightful person I have ever been around in my life.  She is considerate and animated.  She is loving and animated.  She has become quite the conversationalist and did I mention ANIMATED?

By animated I mean this little person is aware of what she is doing and is going for maximum effect.

Like today, she told somebody at my office, "Texas Rangers won last night."  He replied, "No they didn't, they lost in extra innings."  Amanda threw her arms in the air and said, "You asked the wrong person."  He said, "I didn't ask you, you just told me."  Her final reply, "Don't even start it."

Last week in the pool I had the fountain turned on for the first time.  It's a basically a sprinkler that throws an arc of water.  It can be adjusted so that it shoots high across the pool and and rains down.  Our entire time in the pool I had it on a low setting and Amanda simply stayed under the falling water for thirty minutes or so.  When it was time to get out of the pool I set the fountain on the higher setting so it would cool the water that will otherwise boil.  Amanda sees the water raining down and yells, "Hold on a minute!!!"  She then swims out to the middle of the pool and floats on her back for about five minutes and says, "Oh Yeah!!!  That's the stuff!"

And finally, Monday night we had three kids over while their parents went out for the evening.  The six year old girl is precious but the two year old is well, well she is two so she is pretty much like a badger with rabies.  The three are in Amanda's room with the door closed and they are laughing and playing.  The kids parents show up and I'm talking to the dad and now the sound from Amanda's room is akin to the monkey cage at feeding time.  The six year old comes out and tells her daddy that the two year is about to tell on her but she only did what she did because the little badger was being mean to Amanda.  The daddy tells the two year old to come out of Amanda's room.  As the child leaves you hear Amanda exclaim, "OH THANK GOD!!!"

And that is what I say too.  Amanda has surpassed what I have ever dared thought possible and she is only fourteen.  These next few years are going to be awesome.

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